The First Bone

By the time the Zhou and Ning families had eaten their fill and finished packing up, Pang Jian emerged from behind the pile of rocks at just the right moment.

"Pang Jian, you can ride this horse."

Seeing him appear, Zhou Qingchen, who had taken over He Ziren's black horse, waved to him from a distance with a smile.

Beside him stood the very same chestnut warhorse that had originally belonged to Liu Qi, but which Pang Jian had occupied as if it were his own.

"You can use the Dragon-Patterned Spear on the horse."

Zhou Qingchen pointed to the spear hanging along the horse's flank and smiled brightly. "From here on, we're comrades in arms. That long saber you're used to isn't a weapon for cultivators. Miss Ning said you've also embarked on the path of cultivation, so take the Dragon-Patterned Spear and try it out."

"Later, if we find something more suitable, you can always switch."

The old and young members of the Ning family watched Zhou Qingchen's sudden change in attitude toward Pang Jian, unable to figure out what he was up to.

First he'd taken the initiative to bring meat to the pile of rocks, then he'd gifted Pang Jian the Dragon-Patterned Spear of one of his dead subordinates. These strange actions made the two Ning family members suspicious.

The remaining Zhou family retainers, including Han Duping, were also bewildered by Zhou Qingchen's behavior.

Pang Jian, however, remained calm. After a quiet word of thanks, he climbed onto the warhorse and tried lifting the Dragon-Patterned Spear.

The shaft felt rough in his hands, with natural wood grain. Looking closely, it really did bear some resemblance to a dragon's scales.

The spearhead was made of some silvery metal that gleamed with a cold light. It looked exceedingly sharp.

Only when he tried to lift the spear did Pang Jian realize that its shaft, made from some unknown wood, was unbelievably heavy—several times heavier than the long saber he usually wielded!

He swung it back and forth to get used to its weight, then held it in both hands and pointed it toward the depths of the mountains. "The Cenji Mountains are vast. Do you have a specific direction in mind?"

Zhou Qingchen thought for a moment. "We'll head north, toward the place closest to the Ghost Mist."

Ning Yao and Ning Yuanshan both paled slightly at his words and stared at him in surprise.

When they'd discussed their plans earlier, they'd only talked about searching for the Heavenly Phoenix's remains, along with artifacts left behind by the Blood Moon, Galaxy Alliance, and Yin Spirit Temple.

The Ning family hadn't actually planned to venture into the far north and risk exploring the strange Ghost Mist.

"It's fine. We're not actually going into the area covered by the Ghost Mist."

Apparently noticing their misgivings, Zhou Qingchen continued with a cheerful smile, "I just have a feeling that the Heavenly Phoenix's remains, along with the search parties from the three major powers, are somewhere in the north, near the Ghost Mist."

Ning Yuanshan reluctantly agreed. "Then... all right."

"The valley we're in lies at the southernmost end of the Cenji Mountains. If we head north, we can go straight ahead. But there are two possible routes: one follows the mountain path and requires climbing high peaks. The other follows the winding river, but it'll take us on a detour and slow us down. Which way do you want to go?"

Pang Jian took the initiative to ask.

"You know this place best, so you decide," Zhou Qingchen said, looking completely unconcerned.

"Since we're on horseback, I recommend following the river," Pang Jian said seriously.

"Your call," Zhou Qingchen replied with an easy smile.

Ning Yao furrowed her brows, silently displeased. Pang Jian was clearly a guide she'd hired with her own money, yet from the way Zhou Qingchen was acting, he seemed to have become Zhou's man.

She was displeased, but didn't show it. Instead, she kept quiet.

From then on, Pang Jian decided their route and direction. He led everyone along a stream whose water ran murky.

Whenever the group stopped to rest and eat, Pang Jian would slip away alone to some quiet spot. There, he would take the cracked, gray-white stone from his Bamboo Basket and cultivate using the Pot-Heaven Qi Cultivation Art.

As long as he covered the cracks in the stone with his palm, a rich stream of Profound Yin Power would flow out and enter the Spirit Sea in his dantian, washing away the impurities within.

The strange stone he'd found by chance had accelerated his cultivation tremendously. Much of the "cotton fluff" in his Spirit Sea had been cleared away.

As the "cotton fluff" continued to diminish, he could clearly feel his Spirit Sea growing brighter and more spacious. The force he guided into it afterward met less and less resistance as it moved.

He soon became certain that, with the stone's help, it wouldn't be long before he cleared all the impurities from his Spirit Sea.

"A bone from the Heavenly Phoenix!"

That day, Zhou Qingchen was gazing from atop his warhorse toward the distant forest, dense with trees, when he suddenly cried out in excitement. "Do you see it?"

At his reminder, everyone looked into the distance. They immediately spotted a withered bone, like a pillar holding up the sky, embedded in the forest several miles away. Even from afar, its sight was breathtaking.

"Let's go!"

Everyone whipped their reins, urging their warhorses to pick up speed.

As their guide, Pang Jian was stunned by the enormous bone and fell behind the others.

Only when he drew closer did he realize just how huge a single bone of the Heavenly Phoenix was. He couldn't help wondering just how enormous the mysterious Heavenly Phoenix itself must have been.

When he realized the others were about to disappear from sight, he hurriedly urged his horse forward.

A short while later, Pang Jian, bringing up the rear, finally reached the place where the Heavenly Phoenix's bone stood.

The withered bone was over a hundred meters long, thrust into the forest like a sword. Countless cracks spread across the earth around it, branching like a spiderweb.

It was as if the moment it pierced the ground, it had unleashed a terrifying shock wave, whose lingering force had torn the surrounding earth apart!

Even from dozens of meters away, a vast, ancient, sacred aura emanated from the dull bone. Everyone who looked up at it felt an irresistible urge to prostrate themselves in worship.

The Heavenly Phoenix's bone stood over the earth like a mountain, as if it could suppress every demon in the heavens across the Cenji Mountains.

Pang Jian's mind was shaken to its core.

A single bone was over a hundred meters long and as thick as the root of a giant tree. Just how earth-shattering must the Heavenly Phoenix have been when it lived?

Was it not a being straight out of myth?

No wonder the divine bird that had once hovered above his home had been so easily slain.

"The Blood Moon's Indeterminate Ferry!"

While Pang Jian's thoughts surged, Ning Yuanshan suddenly let out a soft cry and pointed behind the bone.

In the next moment, the enormous sailboat Pang Jian had seen before emerged from behind the bone in his line of sight. A black brocade banner flew from it, with a blood-red crescent moon drifting across the fabric.

"Let's go take a look!"

At Ning Yuanshan's call, Pang Jian and the others rode around the bone to get a closer look.

The sailboat was dozens of meters long. It had crushed countless trees and now rested atop a heap of splintered wood and dead branches.

Bloodstained skeletons littered the area around the boat. On some of their clothes, the Blood Moon insignia was still visible.

"These are the real Blood Moon cultivators."

Ning Yuanshan glanced at them, then covered his nose. "After they died, the nearby beasts must have eaten their flesh and organs. Look, there are even bloodstained gold and silver objects spat out beside their corpses."

Unlike the skeletons inside the pile of rocks, which had belonged to Yin Spirit Temple members wearing Blood Moon clothes, the skeletons here had been stripped of their flesh. A stinging, bloody stench rose from them, enough to make anyone retch.

"Were they killed by the beasts nearby, or by people from the Yin Spirit Temple and Galaxy Alliance? Or is there some other danger in the Cenji Mountains?" Ning Yao wondered aloud, eyeing the skeletons.

"The beasts of the Cenji Mountains shouldn't be capable of killing cultivators," Pang Jian said.

Having roamed the Cenji Mountains for years, he knew better than anyone what kind of power the beasts here possessed.

He didn't think even the most ferocious beasts could take on people like Zhou Qingchen or Ning Yuanshan. So the Blood Moon cultivators' deaths should have had nothing to do with the mountain beasts.

"No, you don't understand the power of the Ghost Mist."

Zhou Qingchen's face was grave as he shook his head. "I'm certain the Ghost Mist has seeped through the Boundary Wall into the northernmost part of the mountains. Any beast that strays inside and manages to come back out will undergo a mutation. It'll become a ferocious beast or spirit beast many times stronger than before."

"And once that happens, it won't be a species you recognize. You can't even call it a beast anymore."

Pang Jian's heart tightened at those words. He realized he truly knew little about the Ghost Mist.

Although he'd spent years roaming the Cenji Mountains, he'd never come into contact with the Ghost Mist. His father had also kept him under strict orders never to hunt in the far north.

"Whoosh! Whoosh!"

A gust of wind suddenly howled. The black banner raised above the Indeterminate Ferry snapped and fluttered in the wind.

The enormous scarlet crescent moon at the center of the banner began to release an eerie red glow, bathing the surrounding area in a deep crimson light.

Beneath that red glow, the fleshless skeletons suddenly looked terrifying.

"Don't make any rash moves."

Zhou Qingchen stared at the Blood Moon on the banner and quietly sensed its presence before speaking. "I'll go check whether anything divine remains in this fallen bone of the Heavenly Phoenix. As for you... wait over there for now. Whatever you do, don't touch the objects left behind by those corpses, and don't go near the Indeterminate Ferry."

"All right!"

Having suffered a grievous loss at the pile of rocks, the group was much more cautious this time. They obediently followed his instructions.

Zhou Qingchen dismounted. He either skirted the wider fissures or leaped over them, soon reaching the spot where the enormous bone had landed.

With his back to the others, he took something from his robe and inspected it closely.

"No."

Zhou Qingchen soon had his answer.

Still facing away from the others, he put the object away before turning around. "It's just an ordinary Phoenix Bone. There's nothing unusual inside it. The Blood Moon cultivators' deaths had nothing to do with this bone. Something else must have killed them."

"All right, everyone can spread out and look around now. Just be careful."

In Zhou Qingchen's eyes, the Heavenly Phoenix's bone had been the most terrifying thing here. Seeing that it wasn't what he'd feared, he relaxed a little and waved for everyone to search as they pleased.

But he still reminded them, "As for... the Indeterminate Ferry, no one is to go inside. Check the bodies first and see whether there's anything strange about the objects they left behind."

The group quickly got to work.

Pang Jian knew he probably had no chance of claiming the cultivators' belongings, so he might as well wait for Zhou Qingchen to offer him something. Rather than joining the others in scavenging, he waited quietly.

After an unknown amount of time, Zhou Qingchen suddenly frowned again and called out, "Someone's coming."

The others, who had been busy searching, stopped at once and stood on guard, their expressions tense.

Whether from the Blood Moon or the Yin Spirit Temple, they were cultivators from the Upper Realm, and most of them were at a higher level than the group.

Many powerful figures had already died in the Cenji Mountains. What chance did they stand against them?

They had no choice but to be doubly cautious.

A moment later, amid deliberately muffled rustling, a group gradually came into view, emerging from the forest behind the Indeterminate Ferry.

When the two sides saw each other, they both breathed a sigh of relief.

"People from the Zhou and Ning families!"

"So it's people from the Shangguan Family!"

With relieved exclamations, a group of nine finally dared to show themselves openly. Just moments before, they'd been even more cautious than the others.

The woman at their head was dressed like a dignified matron, wearing an exquisitely embroidered, brightly colored gown. Fine jewelry glittered all over her.

Beautiful-faced, she was like a ripe peach, her figure curving in all the right places.

At that moment, she pressed a hand to her pale, ample cleavage and complained theatrically, "You scared me half to death! I thought we'd run into survivors from the Upper Realm who were going to slaughter us all."

The voluptuous beauty approached with a swaying gait, tossing Zhou Qingchen a flirtatious look from afar. "Qingchen, it's been ages since we last met. I can finally relax now that I see it's you."

Zhou Qingchen smiled breezily. "So it's Aunt Qin."

"Qin, your Brother Han is here too." Han Duping, grotesquely obese, squinted at her with lustful eyes, staring at the pale expanse of her chest without even looking at her face. "Everyone says you're a jinx to your husbands, but I'm not afraid. Your two men are already dead, anyway. Why don't you and I make do with each other?"

"If you just say the word, I'll split from that Zhou brat right now and join the Shangguan Family."

Han Duping thumped his chest in assurance, acting as though he could break with Zhou Qingchen this very instant and become a willing servant at her feet.

Zhou Qingchen knew exactly what Han Duping was like. He smiled helplessly. "We've known each other a long time, after all. If you really do that, Old Han, I'll have no choice but to send you off with a heavy heart—and a generous parting gift."

"Bah! You fat winter melon, stop dreaming!" Disgust and coldness filled Shangguan Qin's beautiful face as she mocked him without the slightest courtesy. "You old toad, and you think you can eat swan meat?"

"Ha! You've already killed two husbands, and you're not young anymore. You can hardly call yourself a swan!" Han Duping teased, airing her dirty laundry.

Shangguan Qin was so enraged that she began breathing hard. If anything, it made her ample chest rise and fall even more prominently.

"Eek! Eek!"

A tall, burly man wrapped in thick armor appeared behind the Shangguan Family's group, dragging a massive iron cage with one hand.

Pang Jian, who'd been standing among the Ning and Zhou families without paying much attention to the newcomers, suddenly looked toward the gray ape in the cage.

The gray ape's strange Ice Blue eyes were full of savage fury. Though it had been made a prisoner, it still radiated bloodlust.

As soon as Pang Jian saw it, the wounded gray ape turned its gaze toward him as well.

"Do you know it?"

Ning Yao, standing beside Pang Jian, followed the gray ape's Ice Blue gaze and looked at him, surprised. She couldn't help asking.